To Make a Dance
by Laura W
Summary: The sequel to 2012's "To Make an End." J/C, The Morning After. Enjoy.
1. Chapter 1

NOTE: Almost four years ago, I got an irresistible bug to start writing fiction again. Naturally, I turned to J/C fanfiction. My first effort after many years of not writing while my husband and I raised our daughter was called "To Make an End." This is the sequel, "To Make a Dance." Rest assured, this one is actually finished for a change. There's a chunk in the middle that needs a bit of work, but the rest is ready to roll. This one is quite a lot longer than its predecessor, so I'll post in parts while I edit. And you really do need to have read "To Make an End" for this to make any sense at all. Enjoy.

 **"To Make a Dance"**

 **Part 1**

They had, in fact, lost their minds.

Kathryn had suspected it as soon as she realized she was honestly considering Chakotay's mad marriage proposal on the strength of one lunch date (which wasn't even a "date," strictly speaking), one pleasant afternoon walk, and one rather chaste kiss. Seven years together notwithstanding, no sane person would have even entertained the idea. Not after eight months – and a couple of ill-advised affairs – apart.

And yet she had not only agreed to it, she had one-upped his madness nicely by demanding that they formalize the commitment right then and there, on the Bridge of _The Voyager Experience,_ in the middle of an otherwise unremarkable Friday afternoon.

"We've lost our minds," she said, sauntering through her cramped Starfleet apartment the next morning.

In her defense, between his proposal and her capitulation there had also been one mind-numbing, toe-curling, Bridge-shaking kiss, a kiss that promised enough good things to come that perhaps she could be forgiven her temporary insanity.

But the evidence had continued to mount over the next hour that they'd both left their rational selves behind somewhere, possibly as far back as the noodle shop. _I blame the tea,_ she thought in retrospect. _Coffee from now on. Nothing but black coffee._

By the time a very bewildered Owen Paris had arrived on the Bridge, there was no help for them. They were too far gone to turn back. Owen had stood there staring at the pair of them for a good thirty seconds, first at her, then at him, then at their clasped hands, then back at her again. "You want me to _what?_ "

She had explained as patiently as possible that this was, in fact, what they wanted; that yes, they wanted to do it right there, right then, on the Bridge; and that no, they were not under alien mind control. She glanced at Chakotay out of the corner of her eye for confirmation; he shook his head quickly. "So we're fine," she said, "and we want to get married. Right now."

"Before you change your minds," Owen said flatly.

"No, Owen, we are not going to change our minds." She rubbed her forehead. "I just want to do this before Chakotay crashes another shuttlecraft or gets himself assimilated or contracts a disease that renders him permanently impotent." Beside her, Chakotay flinched violently. She ignored him. "So please, Owen, just pull up the standard ceremony on your padd and let's get started."

"Now?"

"Now."

"But what about witnesses? We should call Tom and B'Elanna. They -"

"No," Chakotay interrupted. "Not yet. We're not going to tell anyone yet. And neither are you."

"But why not?"

"Because that's the way Kathryn wants it." Chakotay leaned forward and loomed over the older man. "All right?"

Owen started and backed away a half step. "All right."

Kathryn smirked. _Nice bluff, Angry Warrior_.

Owen fumbled with his padd. "But you'll still need witnesses."

They had summoned Ensigns Lavin and Novotna, figuring that since they'd greeted Admiral Paris in the transporter room they must be dying to know what was going on. Kathryn explained the situation, earning them handshakes and hugs from their new Best Man and Maid of Honor. The price of the Ensigns' silence had been easy enough to pay: Two invitations to the formal ceremony, whenever that would be. "Done," Kathryn announced, and they all turned expectantly to Admiral Paris.

The older man hesitated. "Kathryn..." he began. "Your father would want me to say something."

"What?"

"All of this," he waved his hand at Chakotay and the Ensigns, "is not like you. You are not by nature an impulsive person. Or you weren't, before the Delta Quadrant. I have to be sure: Is this really what you want?"

"Don't mistake decisiveness for impulsiveness, Owen," she warned. "You know me better than that."

Owen acknowledged her with a quick nod. "Still," he said carefully, "this is a life-altering decision, Kathryn. You can't blame me for asking."

"Fair enough." She took one deep breath, then two. Chakotay's hand brushed the small of her back. "I know that right now, I probably sound...a little unhinged," she began.

Owen shook his head. "That's not it."

Kathryn held up a hand. "Let me finish." She took another deep breath. "There are going to be people who question the circumstances. They're going to think that I've been...pining away like a lovesick teenager since we got back, just waiting for Chakotay to come to his senses and crawl back to me. But you and I both know that's not the case."

"True," Owen said. "We all knew Adam Cornell was probably wrong for you, including Adam. But before that... I have to say I was really rooting for that Doctor Sobari. Tom thought it wouldn't last, but I -"

She inclined her head toward Chakotay and cleared her throat.

Owen rocked back and forth on his heels. "Right. Go on, Kathryn."

She continued. "There are going to be people who question the timing. They're going to wonder if I swooped in and convinced him to get married right away because I was afraid he'd run off with the next blonde bombshell who sashays into his field of vision."

"Uh, Kathryn?" Chakotay's voice was very tight. "You know I'm still here, right?"

She grabbed his hand. "The point, and I want you all to listen very carefully to this, is that none of that matters to me. None of it. I know the truth. And the truth," she finally looked up at him, "is that seven years, eleven months and four hours ago, give or take a few minutes, a man materialized on this Bridge, in this very spot, who I was not supposed to trust. But I did trust him. Instinctively, and almost immediately. Because I realized very soon after I met him that he was so much more than his Starfleet intelligence file. He is an honorable man who has strong beliefs and opinions but who has always been willing to listen to me – even when I'm wrong. Over the years he has debated with me. He has fought with me. And yes, he has hurt me. But he also kept me going more than once when he barely had the strength to carry on himself. He supported me when I needed it and kept me honest when I was deluding myself. He refused to let me wallow in guilt over stranding us in the Delta Quadrant. He made me laugh. And he loved me. Even when he wasn't able to say it out loud, I knew. I've known all along. I've _loved_ him all along. And in the end, that's the only thing that matters to me. He loves me, and I love him."

She turned back to Owen. "And I want to marry him right here, right now, not because I'm afraid I'm going to lose him to someone else and not to prove that I won some juvenile competition for the affections of the cutest boy in algebra class. I want to marry him because after seven years in the Delta Quadrant, getting engaged seems redundant and dating seems ridiculous. I want to spend the rest of my life with him, and I want it to start right now. There are going to be people who don't believe that. But that's the truth. Is that clear enough for you?"

She was answered by several voices at once: "Yes, ma'am!" She was not entirely certain whose voices they were, but found she didn't much care.

Owen turned to Chakotay. "And what about you?" he asked.

Chakotay stood up very straight. "I don't believe I need to justify myself to you, sir, but for Kathryn's sake I'll try." He took a deep, calming breath. "It's possible no one will believe this, but I think I loved Kathryn from the first time I saw her. I arrived on this Bridge armed and angry, ready to fight." He looked down at her, his brown eyes very soft. "And I was faced down by a tiny woman in a Starfleet uniform who had freckles – and the most beautiful blue eyes I'd ever seen. I knew right away I was in more trouble than I thought. She refused to give me the fight I was looking for, and I've been grateful for that ever since. Because she challenged me. She made me think carefully about who I am and what I believe. She made me a better man, just by asking me to live up to her expectations. For seven years she put up with my mistakes and my weaknesses. We argued and fought, we saw each other sick and injured and hopeless. We hurt each other. We laughed and cried together, we went to hell and back. And through it all, even when times were hard, even when I felt like giving up and moving on, I never stopped loving her."

He directed his steady gaze back at Owen. "I didn't propose to her because someone else rejected me or because I'm afraid of being alone. Kathryn is my best friend and my only love and it's time I committed myself to her in the only way I haven't already. So whenever you're ready, sir."

One of the Ensigns sniffled. Kathryn blinked back tears. Owen rocked on his heels again. "Well," he said. "I suppose that covers the vows. I guess we'll just...go on with the ceremony."

And so it was that seven years, eleven months, and four hours after they had first met as enemies on the Bridge of the _Voyager_ , Kathryn and Chakotay were married in that same place by the bemused father of their longtime pilot, attended by a pair of grinning Ensigns.

"We've completely lost our minds," Kathryn said again with a smirk, surveying the previous night's refuse strewn all over her living room: an empty champagne bottle, the scattered pieces of both their uniforms, an untidy pile of practically priceless antique books they'd knocked to the floor in a moment of indecent haste.

"Did you say something?" Chakotay ambled out of her bathroom wearing nothing but a very small towel and a very large smile.

It was the same expression, she knew, that had been plastered all over her own face for the last twelve hours or so.

After the ceremony, such as it was, they'd managed to keep their hands off each other long enough to go back to the city for a light dinner and a bottle of champagne. All she could remember now about that dinner was that they hadn't eaten much of it. It was very hard to eat when they couldn't stop laughing at each other, at the complete folly and utter inevitability of what they'd just done.

The walk back to her apartment could have been awkward, but it wasn't. They simply slipped their arms around each other as they had earlier in the day and strolled through the moonlit streets.

With increasing speed the closer they got to their destination.

After all, they had seven years, eleven months, and four hours of lost time to make up for.

Which, upon arrival, they did. Quite thoroughly.

Kathryn allowed herself a sultry little grin.

His chuckle brought her back to the present. "I'd ask what you're thinking, but I'm pretty sure I know."

She shook her head. "I was thinking that we're probably certifiable for what we did last night, but I really don't care."

"Which part of what we did last night?"

"The marriage part."

"Kathryn, was it really any crazier than any of the other crazy things we've done over the years?"

"It was far more sane than making Neelix our cook."

"There you go," he said. He leaned over and kissed the top of her head. She got the distinct feeling it was something he'd wanted to do before but couldn't. "Stop second-guessing yourself and enjoy it."

As he squeezed past her and headed for the coffee pot, she kept an appreciative eye on that small towel. "Oh, I am," she said. "I definitely am."

He poured two cups of coffee, handed one to her and stirred a truly obscene amount of cream and sugar into his own. She grimaced. Such a senseless waste of innocent caffeine. "So, Wife," he said. "What do you want to do today? Any more dates I can help you break? Or maybe -"

Somewhere, a comm badge bleeped.

 _"Torres to Chakotay. Where the hell are you?"_

They froze, staring at each other.

 _"I've been trying to comm your apartment. Are you still coming to breakfast?"_

He gasped and closed his eyes.

 _"Come on, Chakotay. Don't make me come looking for you."_

In a flash, they both started searching for the comm badge among the scattered pieces of their uniforms, repeatedly bumping into each other in the tiny apartment. She had a fleeting thought of reprimanding him for losing the little pin, but given that she was reasonably sure he'd forgotten his own name at a particular moment around midnight, she decided to overlook his absentmindedness. Just this once.

 _"All right, now I'm worried. You didn't even call to tell me if you found Janeway yesterday."_

They both dove for the couch and the sound of the disembodied voice coming from beneath it. The sudden lunge nearly caused him to lose his towel, which nearly caused her to forget the bleeping comm badge, but then her fingers brushed metal. "Got it!" she cried, and handed him the badge.

He sat back on his heels and activated it. "Chakotay here. Sorry, B'Elanna. I was in the shower."

 _"Oh. Is that why you didn't answer the apartment comm?"_

"Yes."

 _"Did you meet Janeway for lunch?"_

"Yes. She was just where you said she'd be."

 _"How did it go?"_

Their eyes met over the comm in his hands. "All in all, I think it went well."

 _"She was happy to see you?"_

He grinned. "Better than 'happy,' I think."

Kathryn gave him a mock salute.

 _"Glad to hear it, Chakotay,"_ B'Elanna continued. _"Are you going to take the position?"_

"Definitely."

 _"So you're here to stay?"_

"Yes."

 _"Great! Tom, he's staying!"_

They heard Tom's loud bellow from what sounded like the next room. _"Tell him congrats, it's a great opportunity for him, and he better get his sorry ass over here before this French toast gets cold!"_

B'Elanna again. _"Did you hear that?"_

Chakotay winced. "I think they heard you both in Seattle, B'Elanna." He raised a questioning eyebrow at Kathryn. She waved her hand in a shooing motion. "I'll be there in half an hour," he said.

 _"Good. And Chakotay, I'm happy for you. Torres out."_

They both let out a long breath. "Sorry," he said. "I forgot about meeting them for breakfast."

"It's all right. I should probably go to the office for a while. And then -"

The apartment's comm system beeped.

 _"Paris to Janeway."_

Once again, they stopped and stared at each other, eyes wide.

"Maybe it's Owen," she whispered. "They sound a little alike."

He stood up with a grin and started gathering the pieces of their uniforms. "No, actually, they don't."

 _"Admiral, it's Tom. Are you there?"_

Kathryn ran her hands through her hair, secured the tie of her bathrobe, and sat down at her desk to activate the apartment's comm system. "Good morning, Tom." She forced a smile. "And it's 'Kathryn,' now. You know that. What can I do for you this morning?" Behind her, Chakotay pulled on his clothes, careful to stay out of sight of the comm screen.

Tom smiled. _"I've been thinking about the plans for the reunion party, and I wondered if you wanted to go over some ideas. We made way too much French toast this morning. So if you don't have anything going on today..."_

She frowned, pretending to think about it. "I don't know, Tom. I took the afternoon off yesterday and now I have a lot of work to catch up on."

 _"But you haven't had breakfast, right? Come on over and eat something before you go to the office."_ Tom gave her a charming smile. _"B'Elanna just put on a fresh pot of coffee."_

"Well, in that case..." It was a risk and she knew it. But if they were going to pull this off, breakfast together with Tom and B'Elanna would be the perfect test of their ability to keep a secret. A mad and delicious secret. "I can be there in...forty-five minutes."

 _"Sounds good. See you then...Kathryn. Paris out."_

She shook her head and flicked off the terminal. When she turned around she found Chakotay back in uniform except for his bare feet, sitting on her sofa and calmly sipping coffee. He seemed unsurprised that Tom and B'Elanna had offered identical invitations to breakfast. In truth, she wasn't surprised, either. "Do they honestly not know how transparent they are?" she asked.

He shrugged. "They just want us to be happy."

She retrieved the coffee she'd left behind in the search for the comm badge. "If they're not careful, they may get more 'happy' than they ever dreamed of."

He chuckled. "This _is_ bold. Even for them."

"I know. What if I had decided to bring Adam along?"

"You still could. Call him." He hid his smile behind his coffee cup.

She raised an eyebrow at him. "You're kidding."

"No, I'm serious. I want to meet him. Maybe compare notes with him." His smile finally broke through. "And then I want to watch you break up with him again."

Kathryn pinched the bridge of her nose. "I owe him an apology."

"Probably so."

She watched him pull his socks and boots on one by one, then stand and straighten his uniform. It suddenly struck her how different it felt to watch him without caring who was watching _her_. She'd have to be careful around Tom and B'Elanna, who were both very observant, and apparently very interested in her love life. "Are you heading back to your apartment first?"

He nodded. "I want to get out of this uniform and grab an extra shirt. Miral has a tendency to drool all over me."

"She's teething."

"I know." He shook his head fondly. "B'Elanna calls to tell me every little thing. First tooth, first steps, first baby talk..."

"They're good parents."

"Yes, they are. And I never would have believed it."

"Neither would I." It was one of the many good things they'd accomplished in the Delta Quadrant: Helping their younger crewmembers grow into responsible adults.

He leaned against the kitchen counter next to her. "Before I go, we need to get our stories straight."

"How much do you think we should tell them?"

He pulled her into his arms. "If it were up to me I'd open a Federation-wide channel right now and tell the whole quadrant that the bravest, most beautiful and wisest woman I have ever known went completely insane last night and married a contrary middle-aged man who does not deserve her, but who intends to spend the rest of his life trying to make himself worthy."

She stood on her toes and kissed his cheek. "You're sweet."

"But I suppose I should tell my sister first."

"Me too. And my mother."

"What will you tell them?"

She drew away and sat down at the table. "That we're...engaged."

He pulled up a chair next to her. The kitchen was so small their knees bumped together. "You don't have to. You could just tell them we're together. You could work up to the engagement part. Or we could just send out invitations to a wedding reception in a few weeks and let them figure it out."

"No, I can do this." She took his hand in hers. "I want to make it clear to everyone that we've made a commitment, but I don't want to cheat them out of a wedding. They've all been cheering for us for too long. So 'engaged' it is. It won't kill me."

She sighed and sipped her coffee. Last night she'd told him she had no intention of subjecting herself to a long engagement again, given that her first go-round and ended in the tragic death of her fiancé, and the second had ended in her exile in the Delta Quadrant. The whole concept of "engagement" gave her the creeps, as Tom Paris might say. She knew it was irrational, but that was the truth of it.

Chakotay took her face in his hands, forcing her to look in his eyes. "Hey. I won't insult your intelligence by claiming that nothing's going to happen. But we're back in the Alpha Quadrant, I'm not assigned to every landing party anymore, and I don't even own a shuttlecraft." She smiled in spite of herself. He leaned his forehead against hers. "Look at me. I'm a settled old man with a wife and soon, a mortgage. I'm not going to take any chances. We're going to have a long life together, Kathryn. Don't worry."

"I know," she said. "And it's moot anyway, since we're already married." She placed a hand on his cheek, then closed the space between them for a long, languid kiss.

When he pulled away and leaned his forehead against hers again, she was gratified to note that he was completely out of breath. "I need to go," he sighed. "Or I never will."

She laughed and kissed him again quickly before rising and leading him to the door. "I'll call Mom and Phoebe this afternoon."

"Do you want me to be there?"

"Of course."

He leaned against the wall next to her door – lingering, as he'd done a hundred times before in her quarters. "I'll have to get on a subspace relay to call my sister. Maybe we can go to your office?"

She nodded. "Right after breakfast. We can make all the calls at the same time."

"When do you want to tell everyone else?"

"How about the reunion party next month?"

He laughed softly and shook his head, as if envisioning the pandemonium the announcement would cause. "I can't wait for that. What are we going to tell Tom and B'Elanna about yesterday?"

"We'll tell them that we had lunch, took a walk, visited _Voyager_ , and went home."

"Strategic omission?"

"Diplomacy," she countered.

"Diplomacy it is, Admrial." He leaned down to kiss the top of her head again; she realized she was going to have to get used to the gesture, because he was going to be doing it for the rest of their lives. "See you in a few minutes, Wife."

She swatted his arm and shoved him out the door.

Kathryn polished off the last of the coffee and retrieved her uniform, which he'd placed in a neat pile on her sofa. The dear man had straightened up before he left, no doubt while she was talking to Tom. The books were stacked again in their usual places and the empty champagne bottle was nowhere to be found. Even the throw pillows on her sofa seemed to have been fluffed and replaced. Kathryn smiled. It was something she remembered from both _Voyager_ and New Earth; he hated to leave a room untidy. She wondered if it had bothered him that they'd left the place a mess last night.

 _Probably not_ , she decided. _We were both pretty preoccupied._

She laughed to herself and headed for the bathtub.

The apartment already felt empty and quiet without him there. Then again, she could look back now and admit that after their many after-shift strategy sessions that turned into late-night dinners and wine, her quarters on _Voyager_ had also always seemed empty and quiet after he'd left.

Maybe that's what had caused her to accept his proposal in the first place: The certainty that even after everything had changed between them, it would feel as though nothing had changed at all. They already knew virtually everything there was to know about each other. Marriage was bound to bring a surprise or two, but after years of warm and close friendship the surprises would certainly be few, and mostly confined to a single area.

Kathryn shrugged off her bathrobe and lowered herself into the tub with a moan of complete satisfaction. She closed her eyes and leaned back into the bubbles. She was exhausted and sore and hadn't felt so good in years.

Whatever surprises were still in store would be fun to discover together, if last night was any indication. She allowed herself that sultry little smile again.

They'd completely lost their minds. And it felt like the sanest thing they'd ever done.

-END of Part 1-


	2. Chapter 2

NOTE: Sorry this took so long. The holidays really ate a lot of my time and energy this year. I'll try to post the rest more quickly.

Part 2

He couldn't remember ever having laughed so much.

From noon to midnight, from his first glimpse of her in the noodle shop to the moment they had finally connected in the only way they never had before, Chakotay felt he'd done nothing but laugh with her at the sheer joy of it all. Over the years he'd forgotten that she could do that to him, that she could, with just a word or a touch or a sidelong glance, bring a delighted smile to his face. At the beginning of their journey he'd reflexively hidden it away, reluctant to give up too much, both professionally and personally. As he grew to trust her it became easier to let himself show what he felt – to let himself _feel_ what he felt – whenever she was nearby.

Their years in the Delta Quadrant hadn't all been mirthful, of course, but looking back now he realized that the hard times, while an important factor in the shape their relationship would eventually take, weren't nearly as critical as the good times – the meals shared in the quiet of her quarters, the long conversations about the homes they'd left behind, the nights they'd stayed up late going over supply reports and personnel evaluations. The laughter they'd cajoled from each other. After all they'd been through, the fact that they could still make each other laugh as if nothing else in the universe mattered was nothing short of miraculous.

In retrospect, Chakotay decided that must have been the real reason he'd wanted to find her yesterday. In the eight months since _Voyager_ 's return, he'd had precious little reason to laugh. The debriefings had been hard on him, knowing as he did that the threat of incarceration for the Maquis was just that: A threat. There weren't enough free Maquis left to pose any sort of danger to the Federation, and yet they'd dangled time in a New Zealand penal colony in front of him as a way to force his compliance. They needn't have bothered. Starfleet had had him over a barrel and they knew it. To show anything other than compliance would reflect badly on Kathryn and on the other remaining Maquis. And so he had complied. His eventual release was a relief, not a joy. He and Seven had left the planet almost immediately; the constant scrutiny from the media was just too much for both of them to take.

And the months with Seven on Deep Space Nine... Not exactly joyful. They'd had some good times, certainly, but in all those months he was pretty sure he hadn't laughed with her half as much as he had with Kathryn in the last twelve hours. His former Captain brought out a part of him that he'd missed with Seven and feared he had lost forever. Truthfully, he didn't much care for the man he'd become with Seven. Possessive. Needy. Vain. And by the end, desperately lonely.

Something was wrong, something was missing, and for a long time he'd been at a loss as to what it could be. The split with Seven had helped a little – and a month in a Bajoran temple had gone a long way toward helping him find his balance again. But still... At first he'd attributed his unsettled feelings to too many life changes at once, but deep down he knew that wasn't really it. Change had never bothered him before. He was a man who made the most of his surroundings wherever he was, living in the now and finding the good in his circumstances. But it was hard to find the good in being directionless for the first time in ten years. He didn't know where to go or what to do. He didn't know anything at all, except that Dorvan wasn't home and probably never would be. The offer to return to Earth had come as a relief not because it was home, either, but because it was something new to try, somewhere new to go.

He'd been there only a day before he realized that he wanted to stay. But it took him two full weeks to admit to himself _why_ he wanted to stay, and it had nothing to do with Starfleet. She was there, Kathryn, _his_ Kathryn, and though B'Elanna and Tom had made it very clear that she was happy and successful and moving on with her life without him, he knew he didn't want to move on with his life without _her_.

He asked B'Elanna where he could find her.

B'Elanna's face had hardened – first because she couldn't believe he hadn't sought her out as soon as he'd arrived on the planet, and second because she questioned his motives. "It took her a long time to put herself back together after _Voyager_ returned, Chakotay," B'Elanna had growled, "and she could have used a friend. But you ran off with Seven at the first opportunity. Don't you dare upset her again."

He'd been surprised by B'Elanna's vehemence. He knew from other former crew that after B'Elanna's resignation from Starfleet the two women had become close friends, but he wondered just what Kathryn had told her to make her so wary of him. How had Kathryn described their relationship on _Voyager_ to B'Elanna, the years they'd spent creeping to the edges of protocol and testing the strength of barriers they both knew couldn't be crossed? What had she said about old Admiral Janeway? Had they talked about his relationship with Seven?

And if they had talked about Seven, how had B'Elanna, who had seen him with women before _Voyager_ , who knew what he'd been like before Kathryn, characterized that relationship?

He'd decided not to ask.

"Friendship first," he'd said to B'Elanna solemnly. "For now, I just need my friend back, because I'm not sure I like who I am without her. If anything else happens, it'll be her decision, not mine. I'll take whatever she wants to give me. And if all she can give me is her friendship, it'll be more than I deserve."

B'Elanna had sent him off to the noodle shop with a warning not to push too hard.

He'd vowed to keep things light. And he had. For about half an hour.

As soon as Kathryn had admitted that Adam Cornell wasn't what she needed in her life, the path in front of Chakotay had started to become clear.

At noon, spending the rest of his life with her had been the furthest thing from his mind. By 1600, it was the only thing he could think about.

He missed her friendship, craved her love, and needed to be back at her side, the only place he'd ever felt truly at peace.

Proposing to her had been the only logical thing to do once that realization had set in. It was a risk, to be sure, but they'd taken risks before – some of them several orders of magnitude larger than marriage.

Once he'd done a little fast talking, she'd come around to the same realization. Her eagerness to formalize their commitment right away had surprised him at first, but he should have seen it coming. She'd once been the Captain of a starship. She never did anything halfway.

And so they were married. Just like that.

Aside from a few minutes here and there, and one blissful moment around midnight when he was pretty sure the Universe had collapsed and reformed around them, he'd been laughing ever since.

Because it was just so _easy_.

Finding her in the noodle shop: Easy. He'd only been waiting for a few minutes when Kathryn had turned up for her customary Friday afternoon lunch, exactly as B'Elanna had said she would.

Talking to her: Easy. They'd fallen back into their customary banter as if no time at all had passed, as if _Equinox_ and Seven had never even happened.

Laughing with her: Easy. So very easy. He'd always thought her beautiful and smart and compelling, but walking through the sunny streets of San Francisco with her, hand-in-hand, had felt so right and simple and delightful that he couldn't believe he'd put it off so long.

And loving her…

 _Like coming home_ , he mused, taking the steps up to the Officer Housing complex two at a time. _Like being welcomed to a place you know you'll never want to leave, the home you'll always want to return to._

He hadn't been surprised by her passion; he'd always known it was there, simmering just below the surface. He _had_ , however, been surprised by his own reaction to her intensity. For years, he'd watched her turn her fierce intelligence and single-minded scrutiny on scientific phenomena, engineering conundrums, and unknown aliens of every size, shape, and mystery.

To have all that attention focused on _him_ , though… _That_ was something else altogether.

Shucking off his day-old uniform, Chakotay smiled to himself. _I should have known_ , he thought. _I should have known that a woman who can make me laugh with just the angle of her eyebrow could make me howl like an animal if she really put her mind to it._

And she had definitely put her mind to it.

Her mind, her hands, her mouth, and every centimeter of her smooth, creamy, freckled skin.

Chakotay pulled on brown trousers and a white linen shirt, stuffed an extra set of clothing and a few toiletries into an old Starfleet-issue duffel bag, and headed back out of his cramped quarters for breakfast with the Parises…and his new wife.

His feet barely touched the sidewalk as he strolled along the tree-lined streets toward Tom and B'Elanna's house. An old man caught him whistling and smiled at him.

Chakotay shrugged and continued on his way, face turned to the morning sun.

 _So easy_ , he thought.

 _And Spirits, so much fun._

=/\=

"I can't believe we're interfering like this."

She watched Tom rummage through the kitchen cupboards for plates and coffee cups. "Who's interfering? We're...expediting. Big difference."

B'Elanna scowled up at him. "If this 'expediting' of yours scares one of them off..."

"It was your idea!" he yelped.

She hitched the baby higher on her hip and headed for the dining room, heaping plate of French Toast in her free hand. "Yeah, but I didn't think you'd actually _do_ it, Helmboy."

Tom closed the kitchen cupboard and followed her. "'We should call Kathryn,' you said. As soon as you were done with Chakotay." He leaned against the table and began to set out plates and cups. "Those were your exact words. 'We should call Kathryn.'"

"I know, but…"

Tom waited patiently, his hands folded on the back of a dining chair, his expression bordering on pathologically smug.

B'Elanna sighed. "I hope this is a good idea."

Tom sauntered around the table and plucked his daughter from his wife's arms. When he blew a wet raspberry on her cheek, the baby giggled and grabbed a fistful of his shirt. "It's a good idea, B'Elanna," Tom said. "It's a _great_ idea. Chakotay said things went well yesterday, and you know how much he's wanted this."

"But has _Kathryn_ wanted this? She's dated…what?" B'Elanna thought back over the eight months since the _Voyager_ 's return, mentally accounting for every man she'd seen Kathryn with in that time. "Four other men since we got back?"

"Is it really four?"

"Adam Cornell, Nel Sobari, Acayo Gianopoulus , and that guy she picked up on Gavis Prime. The one whose name no one can ever remember."

Tom groaned. "That guy was a disaster. I accused him of being a 'sycophant' once and I don't think he even knew what it meant."

"Good thing he barely lasted two weeks. One of us was going to have to kill him."

"She has been going through them pretty fast. Making up for lost time, if you ask me."

"Admiral Cornell has lasted the longest." B'Elanna ducked into the kitchen and returned with the full pot of coffee and a toddler-sized bowl of rice cereal. "Almost three months now."

"Dad says that's about over."

Sliding into a dining chair, B'Elanna looked up with interest. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. I guess they were all at lunch in the commissary a couple weeks ago, and Cornell started telling some story about a First Contact mission gone wrong. Kathryn was dying of boredom in two minutes flat."

B'Elanna snorted. "Cornell's craziest First Contact scenario is probably less interesting than our most boring one."

"Exactly. Dad thinks Kathryn's going to run out of patience with him pretty soon." Tom pushed Miral's high chair to the edge of the table and strapped the infant into it. "Can't say I'm sorry to hear it."

"Me either." B'Elanna began to shovel rice cereal into Miral's waiting mouth. The baby smacked her lips and giggled. "So you think what we're doing is okay?"

Tom sat down across from her. "Do you think it's not?"

With a little shake of her head, B'Elanna wiped rice cereal from her daughter's chin. "Honestly? I want her to be happy, and I'm not sure any of the men she's dated could make her happy. And when Chakotay came to me to ask where he could find her, he was so…contrite."

"Heart in his hands."

"I hadn't seen him like that in a long time. Years. He said he was sorry for Seven, sorry for staying away so long…"

Tom tucked a lock of stray hair behind her ear. "Sorry for hurting you," he said softly.

B'Elanna swallowed hard and nodded. "And Kathryn."

Eight months, Chakotay had been gone. Eight months, and barely a word for any of them. He'd left with Seven as soon as his debriefing was over and disappeared to Kahless knew where, without a hug or a farewell or even a backward glance. His sudden departure had left many of the crew reeling, chief among them B'elanna and Tom, who could have used his counsel while deciding what to do with the rest of their lives, Harry, who'd been lost without his mentor…and Kathryn, who never even asked him for an explanation. They'd all learned to lean on each other in his absence, and B'Elanna couldn't help but feel grateful for her newfound relationship with Kathryn Janeway, a friendship forged in the fires of mutual longing that neither would openly acknowledge.

It hadn't taken long for B'Elanna to recognize that Kathryn missed Chakotay more than anyone really understood. Tom and the others might think that Kathryn's whirlwind tour of men was nothing more than "making up for lost time," but B'Elanna knew better. Mister Anonymous from Gavis Prime may have looked like an empty-headed sycophant to the unobservant, B'Elanna saw him for what he was: a passionately attentive lover. Acayo Gianopoulus, in addition to being devastatingly handsome, had been an award-winning writer. Nel Sobari? A gifted diplomat and the kindest, most compassionate person B'Elanna had ever met. And of course Adam Cornell, a strong and steady officer. Not very flashy, not even very interesting, but trustworthy and solid.

A devotee, poet, a peacemaker, a soldier.

They'd all been substitutes for Chakotay, and very poor substitutes at that.

Just like Seven had been a very poor substitute for Kathryn.

As soon as she'd seen Chakotay again, B'Elanna had known where the relationship between Kathryn and Chakotay was bound to go. She just had to choose how much to … to _expedite_ it.

B'Elanna scraped the last of the rice cereal out of the bottom of the bowl and spooned into Miral's waiting mouth. "I think we're doing the right thing," she said softly. "I think she wants this almost as much as he does."

"And we're giving them time and space to reconnect without the pressure of being alone together."

"Exactly. It's just up to them what happens next."

The doorbell rang. Tom and B'Elanna looked at each other and smiled. "Showtime," Tom said, and went to answer the front door.

-END of Part 2-


End file.
